People on Facebook feel the urge to share things they see that they believe are clever. They are almost never clever (which would be an excellent name for a band) and worse they are usually stupid to the point of being offensive. Take Mikey’s contribution above, for example. Dear NHL? The whole problem the NHL had was they didn’t want to pay the players more. Did you mean “Dear NHL hockey players”? I suppose that would have made the tiniest bit of sense, but even still, was it really worth the two minutes it took to download a red puck and put some writing on it? Oh, shit, three minutes, pardon me. I forgot he aslo put his nickname and then, get ready for it, turned it sideways. I guess he didn’t want people to think it was his quote, but did want people to think he was the artist who managed to bring that statement to life. For my reader friends from Toronto I have to ask if a man wearing a helmet clearing the snow from the streets should be paid more as well, as clearing the streets during that one really bad snow storm was, in an indirect way, defending the country. What about a man in a beret? What about a man in a skin-tight suit defending his country? How much should he get paid? Should women defending their country even factor into this, Mikey? Or are you a chauvinist prick?

I don’t understand this photo at all. I’ve seen it shared more than once. What does it accomplish? Nothing. I actually think people in the military should be paid more and hockey players should be paid less, but I can’t get behind a message this idiotic. It doesn’t help the cause, Mikey, it makes us look like idiots. Don’t you see that? What country allows the NHL to determine how much money their military gets paid? The people who determine how much hockey players get paid are the people who keep paying a lot of money to watch them play hockey. Those are the people you should be angry with. Maybe you should be angry with the people who aren’t making the military into a reality tv show, as I’m sure they’d start making a lot more money if people could pay a lot to watch them shoot people, possibly placing bets on the outcome. Please don’t think I’m shitting on your respective military in writing this, as I am not. I’m just trying to explain simple econonmics here. If someone does make a show like that I want some money for coming up with the idea, though. And a really good cheeseburger.

I’ll bet the NHL is holding secret meetings and sweating their pucks off as I write this. I’ll bet there’s going to be a military lock out soon if the NHL doesn’t start paying our soldiers more. What the fuck is wrong with the NBA too? They’re not paying doctors and nurses in Ontario enough money, leading to longer waiting-room times and an increased chance of death. Doesn’t a wo/man in doctor shoes deserve to make as much as a wo/man wearing basketball shoes? When is the NFL going to pay teachers more so they’ll stop going on strike? I can’t even believe we elected these sports franchises, to be honest with you. I’ll be cricket would have been far more civic-minded and community strong. Baseball, you will note, has not held any parties in my honour (or yours, don’t kid yourself) and unless they’re planning one hell of a surprise party, I think we can safely say that they never will. What gives?

I have to wonder if I strap on a hard-hat, go on IRC and different forums around the ‘net defending Canaada from the libelous tongues of other countries, if that qualifies and I deserve a pay raise. Probably not, as it’s not exactly challenging. Most of the people who trash talk other countries have never actually been to them, making their opinion very close to completely useless. What do you do when you see a picture like that red puck (I guess a black puck didn’t have the same power) on your newsfeed? I tend to remove that person from ever being able to waste my time again. I used to just delete them but this leads to people thinking you’re an asshole, when obviously you deleted them because they were the asshole. Just because you believe in the spirit of something doesn’t mean you should share when you don’t agree with the message. Alternatively you can make your own counter-message, one equally as stupid but with a slightly different theme to bring everything into perspective. Like this: